SWISS ORGANIZATIONS AGAINST STATEMENTS OFFENSIVE TO MEMORY OF ARMENIANS

PanARMENIAN.Net - The Armenian community and a number of organizations functioning in Switzerland addressed the Armenian leadership, calling to adopt all necessary legislative and diplomatic measures to prevent, in the future, offensive statements against the memory of the Armenian Nation. As reported by the Assembly of Armenians of Europe, the matter specifically concerns a statement lately made by British Ambassador to Armenia Thorda Abbott-Watt on the Armenian Genocide in Ottoman Turkey in 1915. It should be reminded that according to a statement T. Abbott-Watt made during a press conference in Yerevan January 20, the evidence was not sufficiently unequivocal that the massacre of Armenians in 1915 could be categorized as genocide under the 1948 United Nations Convention on Genocide and that the debate on this issue continues among historians and lawyers. Whereas, as noted by the Swiss organizations, already fifteen states, a number of regional parliaments and local administrations, as well as very important international organizations, such as the UN Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, the European Parliament, and the World Council of Churches, officially and unequivocally recognized the Armenian Genocide. The statement criticizes the official Yerevan stand, which did not react to "the highly offensive statements" in a proper manner. The organizations demand that the Armenian Parliament and Government adopt all necessary legislative and diplomatic measures to prevent, in the future, others from making such offensive statements against the memory of the Armenian Nation, as well as Thorda Abbott-Watt apologize publicly for her statement. If she refuses, the Ambassador should be declared persona non grata in the Republic, the statement of Swiss organizations says.